Governor Hochul Announces Agenda to Provide High-Quality Education and Recover from Pandemic Learning Loss

Governor Kathy Hochul today announced a comprehensive agenda to give every child in New York the tools to succeed through a high-quality education as part of the 2023 State of the State. For the first time since its inception, Governor Hochul is fully funding Foundation Aid—an unprecedented achievement—for all school districts across the State. Foundation Aid takes districts’ unique needs into account when allocating funding to address inequities and ensure schools in need receive the funding they deserve. Additionally, the administration is investing $125 million to expand high-quality, full-day prekindergarten and dedicating $250 million to establish high-impact tutoring programs in districts across the State to address student learning lost during the pandemic. Governor Hochul also announced that high school students will be eligible to earn college credits to get a head start on college, reduce student debt, and prepare for their careers.

“All of New York’s students deserve access to a high-quality education, from prekindergarten through their college graduation,” Governor Hochul said. “By making historic investments in public schools, expanding universal prekindergarten and tutoring programs, and expanding the opportunity to earn college credits in high school, we are carving out a path for students to build a brighter future for themselves and for New York.”

This slate of education policies and programs will help New York gain back the ground lost during the pandemic and put students back on track for a brighter future.

Historic New Investments in Public Education

Governor Hochul is fulfilling her commitment to fully fund Foundation Aid, the State’s primary education operating aid formula, which allocates State funds to school districts based on need, community wealth, and regional cost differences. She is investing an additional $2.7 billion, an increase of 13 percent, to a total aid amount of over $24 billion, focusing on students with the greatest needs. New York’s education system will provide the highest level of funding per-student of any state in the nation. This historic level of financial support for New York public schools will reverberate for generations to come, broadening access to opportunity and enabling New York to build the education system of the future.

Invest in Full-Day Prekindergarten

Governor Hochul is doubling down on the State’s investments in early childhood education in order to move New York closer to truly universal prekindergarten. This year, she will add another $125 million to expand high quality, full-day prekindergarten, benefitting approximately 17,500 additional 4-year-old children and their families and bringing the State’s total annual investment in high-quality prekindergarten to $1.2 billion. With this funding, the State will be roughly 95 percent phased-in in terms of full universal prekindergarten coverage for 4-year-old children.

Establish Statewide High-Impact Tutoring Programs to Address Pandemic Learning Loss

Governor Hochul is determined to get our students back on track to address the instruction time lost to the pandemic. The administration will dedicate $250 million of the historic increase in Foundation Aid to establish high-impact tutoring programs in districts across the state. The programs will be established by school districts, either in-house or in partnership with external providers, and focus on assisting students in reading and math in grades 3-8.

The effects of the pandemic on student learning were particularly acute in New York. According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the percentage of fourth-grade students in New York performing at or above basic proficiency levels dropped 10 percentage points in math (from 76 percent to 66 percent) and 8 percentage points in reading (from 66 percent to 58 percent), a larger drop than the national average.

“High-impact tutoring” is one of the interventions that has been shown to be consistently effective in helping students get back on track and meaningfully increase academic achievement. Each student served will receive additional instructional time customized to their individual needs. Effective programs will include multiple sessions per week and will result in meaningful relationships between tutors and students. A meta-analysis of studies found that, on average, tutoring increased achievement by the equivalent of 3 to 15 months of additional regular learning.

Create Programs to Provide College Credits to High School Students

Governor Hochul will invest an additional $20 million to support the establishment of new early college high school and P-TECH programs that allow students to earn college credits in high school. College-level courses provided in high schools allow students to get a head start on college, reduce their student debt, and prepare for a career. To encourage the growth of these programs across the State, new funding will be targeted to school districts working in collaboration with institutions of higher education and industry partners to inform the design of their programs. With an eye toward the technology jobs of the present and future—including the tens of thousands of jobs that will be created in Central New York as a result of the Micron project—programs focused on computer science and computer and software engineering pathways will be prioritized, as will programs serving students in high-need school districts.